The 2026 UN Biodiversity Conference convenes in Yerevan, Armenia, in mid-October. The key question: will Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), meeting at their Conference of the Parties (COP17), take effective action to stop biodiversity destruction?
COP17 will mark the first global review of collective progress toward implementing the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF), adopted in 2022 as the strategic plan for implementing the CBD through 2030.
The global review’s final outcome will be negotiated at COP17. It is based largely on CBD Parties’ national reports and the global report on collective progress in implementing the goals and targets of the GBF. The latter, entitled State of Biodiversity Action, will be released before COP17, but the draft already highlights the slow pace of progress.
Implementation not on track
The focus of the global review is therefore mainly on the inadequate implementation of the GBF – the “implementation gap”. This includes developed countries’ fulfillment of their obligations to provide the means of implementation – finance, technology transfer, and capacity building – to developing countries. Most of the world’s biodiversity lies in developing countries, so they bear the greater burden of implementation. They are reluctant to increase these burdens and introduce new ones related to planning, monitoring, reporting and review when developed countries are not meeting their obligations to provide the means of implementation.
These are important issues; however, without addressing the underlying causes driving biodiversity destruction, it will not be possible to meet the GBF’s goals and targets. The root causes include the rules of the economic and financial system that drive extractivism at the expense of social and environmental well-being, financial flows that fund sectors driving biodiversity loss, regulatory capture by corporations, and the flaws of market logic applied to biodiversity. These causes are rooted in inequitable systems of exploitation and control and create a “justice gap”, which must be seriously confronted.
Biodiversity finance debates
The discussions at COP17 will also center on the “finance gap”, which is usually understood as a shortfall in the financing needed to tackle the biodiversity crisis. Addressing this gap is framed as mobilizing resources from “all sources”.
In fact, the CBD places equity at the center of biodiversity finance. While all Parties have obligations to implement the Convention, there are differentiated obligations for the provision of financial resources. The extent to which developing countries effectively implement their obligations will depend on how well developed countries fulfill their legally binding obligations to provide new and additional financial resources and transfer technology. Article 20 articulates the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities (CBDR).
But these financing obligations have yet to be met, with funding amounts falling far short of the GBF’s targets. Instead, at COP17, the political fight will focus on “broadening the contributor base”. Proposals from developed countries for sovereign contributions to be automatically triggered based on income levels can be viewed as an attempt to undermine CBDR and Article 20 and to avoid their obligations to provide financial resources.
The emphasis on mobilizing resources from “all sources” again sidesteps developed countries’ obligations to provide finance and instead looks to the private sector and “innovative schemes”, such as biodiversity offsets and credits, to fill the “finance gap”. In practice, however, these schemes fail to generate the necessary finance and often deepen social and ecological harm.
Another key area of contention is the criteria for the institutional structure that will operate the CBD’s financial mechanism. Developing countries have long called for a global biodiversity fund under the authority of the COP – one that can build momentum and raise ambition for greater financial resources and that has equitable governance arrangements.
Getting the criteria right, including how Indigenous Peoples, local communities, women and youth can obtain direct financing and participate in governance, will be important in ensuring that the institutional structure operates equitably and justly.
Ensuring climate priorities don’t undermine biodiversity and human rights
A key overarching issue at COP17 will be the integration of biodiversity and climate action and how to translate this into coherent national policies and implementation. A related issue is cooperation among the three Rio Conventions: the CBD, UNFCCC and UNCCD. COP17 will consider options for greater policy coherence and a potential long-term roadmap for cooperation. The challenge is ensuring that biodiversity remains the primary concern of the CBD and that synergies respect distinct mandates without subordinating biodiversity action to carbon-related priorities.
COP17 will also consider a supplement to the voluntary guidelines on Ecosystem-based Approaches to Climate Change Adaptation and Disaster Risk Reduction. Here, the inclusion of sufficient social and environmental safeguards in climate mitigation-related approaches is pivotal.
Many of the important political implications will concern equity and the relationship between climate and biodiversity finance. COP17 can define steps to ensure that climate-related biodiversity finance is additional, that the same financial flow is not counted toward multiple obligations, and that megadiverse countries as well as communities have access to adequate and predictable finance.
Challenges in implementing Article 8(j) and related provisions
COP16 in Colombia closed with a historic decision: the creation of the Subsidiary Body on Article 8(j) and Other Provisions of the Convention Related to Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities (SB8J).
Following its first meeting in October 2025, several critical tasks have been referred to COP17, which is expected to adopt the final modus operandi of SB8j, including coordination mechanisms and regional representation. COP17 is also tasked with finalizing the guidelines for operationalizing GBF Targets 2 and 3, ensuring that respect for traditional knowledge and territorial rights is built into their implementation.
COP17 should take steps to ensure that the new Article 8(j) architecture provides more than an enhanced consultation mechanism for Indigenous Peoples and local communities. It should reflect a meaningful shift in the implementation of the Convention toward genuine recognition of their rights, governance, knowledge systems, customary use and collective action.
This work will cut across many of the CBD’s discussions. But many relevant provisions remain bracketed or voluntary, and their effectiveness will depend heavily on finance, national policy and the extent to which Article 8(j) is mainstreamed into implementation.
Unresolved DSI issues
COP16 adopted a multilateral mechanism, including the Cali Fund, which Parties may use as a means of receiving fair and equitable benefits from the use of digital sequence information (DSI) on genetic resources.
However, significant gaps remain. There is no legal certainty that users of DSI will share benefits, nor is there adequate support to ensure that DSI is made available in compliance with applicable national laws. The initial modalities are intended to provide some predictability for monetary benefit-sharing, but early trends are not encouraging. There is also very little information on non-monetary benefits facilitated to date. Meanwhile, critical follow-up work to ensure that DSI is shared with all Parties in a transparent and accountable manner is lagging.
COP17 will face an underlying stalemate: developed countries and industry seek to avoid additional national access and benefit-sharing obligations, while developing countries seek stronger database accountability and transparency to ensure that DSI from their territories is not inequitably extracted through databases in developed countries. Yet COP17 may not address this, as several unresolved issues concerning the operationalization of the Cali Fund remain.
Safeguarding precaution
The precautionary approach is central to the CBD but is being challenged in biosafety discussions. COP17 will consider a Thematic Action Plan to support capacity-building, technology transfer and knowledge sharing in the context of synthetic biology. Parties have a choice: support precaution and focus on capacity-building for assessment and regulatory oversight, or succumb to the push to promote technology transfer and research, despite little evidence of current or potential benefits. The former would help equip developing countries to make sovereign decisions, while not leaving them bearing the burden of any damage or technology failures.
Under the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, similar challenges abound. Several topics are proposed for further risk assessment guidance for living modified organisms (LMOs). Any guidance must align with the Protocol’s precautionary approach and must not use industry-aligned methods that weaken and narrow risk assessment. Additionally, the question of whether new genome-edited LMOs fall under the Protocol needs urgent resolution. The continued relevance of the Protocol rests on its ability to maintain precautionary oversight of novel technologies while ensuring that risks don’t fall disproportionately on developing countries or communities.
Success at COP17 rests less on closing the “implementation gap” and more on making progress in addressing the root causes of biodiversity destruction, and placing equity, precaution and protection of the rights of Indigenous Peoples, local communities, women and youth at the center of action, thereby closing the “justice gap”. Only then can biodiversity destruction be effectively halted.
With input from colleagues at the Third World Network.
